Major Ick? Problem

[JMB]

Last night when the lights went off everything looked good, today my two dominos are covered in white spots and are probably already dead. My tank was set up in November and has had basically no problems. Here are the basics: 65 gal, live sand and rock, sump type filter, protein skimmer (just added 1 week ago). SG 1.024, ammonia, nitrates, and nitrites are (very) slightly elevated. They were more elevated last week and I did a 20% water change and got things back to normal. As for livestock, 2 dominos, 2 yellow tail damsels, 1 small yellow tang, one fire fish, 2 scollops, 1 brittle star, 1 hermit crab, 1 emerald crab, and a few snails.

What should I do?

 

[reefrunner69]

The fish need to be removed to a QT tank and treated with hyposalinity, the main tank needs to be free of fish for a minimum of 4 weeks to break the life cycle of the parasite. Once the ick is gone and the fish have been treated you can re-introduce them to the main display tank, making sure to acclimate properly. Once your set up...you should QT each and every new fish/addition to the tank for a minimum of 3-4 weeks, this will prevent the reintroduction of ick and disease to your display aquarium.

 

[Sam]

Agree. From the sound of it, if you started the tank in November, and now have all those fish in there, you may have overloaded the baterial capacity of the tank. Just need to go slower.

 

[JMB]

Here's an update. As you can see my original problem started over two weeks ago. I now have a QT tank set up and ready to go. I plan to QT all new fish. Here is my question. Over the last two weeks my two remaining fish have shown no sign of ICH. They seem very healthy. Should I still QT them with hyposalinity or could I just leave them in the tank with no new additions for a few more weeks. In other words, could these fish stay in the tank and the ICH cycle still be broken if they never develop the problem?

 

[reefrunner69]

Should I still QT them with hyposalinity or could I just leave them in the tank with no new additions for a few more weeks. In other words, could these fish stay in the tank and the ICH cycle still be broken if they never develop the problem?

Possibly, but I doubt it, they may have aquired some immunity to the parasite, but can still act as hosts to continue the lifecycle. I would treat them and leave the tank fallow for 4 weeks, just to be safe.

 

[cajunbaby75]

with my battle with ich i QT all the fish i had in tank regardless if they had signs of ich i felt it would break the life cycle as reefrunner said i did what they said ,<people on this site>and had a few secondary infections <so watch for them> but youll be in the right direction with hypo just monitor daily and use a refractometer to get the salinty to 1.009 take it down SLOWLY good luck i feel you pain just got mine back in display after @6 weeks